


in another life you might have known me

by mollivanders



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Expanded Universe, F/M, Gen, Prequel, sliding doors - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-17
Updated: 2017-07-17
Packaged: 2018-12-03 05:55:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11525940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mollivanders/pseuds/mollivanders
Summary: She nods and slides out of the booth, her calm manner belying the sudden uptick of her heart.Rebels. It’s too little to go on and too dangerous to hope, but the ache of Saw’s abandonment is still a sharp wound in her chest. Beyond that, the tattered fragments of her mentor’s intermittent warnings still flutter at the surface of her mind.If they’re not here for her, she can’t give them a reason to be, and if theyarehere for her, she’s in more trouble than even Solo knows.(As she slips out of the cantina, she shoulders past a stern-looking man in a leather jacket heading in the direction she just came from, sharp eyes parsing out the crowd behind her.)





	in another life you might have known me

**Author's Note:**

> I had [this idea](http://ladytharen.tumblr.com/post/155251397139/good-morning-and-happy-new-year-i-have-a-new-star) for a better Han Solo movie a few months ago where Jyn and Han were partners and him bailing on her is behind the reason why she starts out _Rogue One_ in Wobani. I also talked about it [here](http://ladytharen.tumblr.com/post/155613616624/more-han-solo-movie-improvement-ideas). I tweaked a bit of the EU timeline for the new canon but hey, that's the game, isn't it? :)

Cassian lands on Tatooine for the second time that year with less optimism and more determination that before. He’s trying – once more – to convince a Corellian smuggler to work with the Rebellion. He has no expectation it will go according to plan.

(But the Rebellion has always been built on the hope that an endeavor with a small chance of success will prevail.)

More importantly, the smuggler is a resource the Rebellion desperately needs. He has a network of shady partners, a record of breaking deals, and a reputation of playing by his own rulebook.  
Cassian’s not even sure if the smuggler _has_ a rulebook, but if he can convince him to work with the Rebellion on this arms deal, the cause might last another month. If he can convince him to spread the word to his network of friends and uneasy allies, the Rebellion might last another.

So he goes to Tatooine.

+

“Are you sure you’re up for this, kid?” The man across the table is maybe ten years older than her and still speaks with the hint of a Corellian accent he’s tried to mask. His casual, open slouch might put another woman at ease but four years on her own – four years scrabbling in the dirt of the galaxy after Saw left her – has made her sharper out of necessity. She doesn’t miss the way his hand rests easy, just out of sight, over his blaster. 

He’s expecting trouble, but not from her.

(Little does he know.)

“Don’t call me ‘kid’,” she retorts and palms the access card he had subtly slid across the table to her. “I’ll take care of it.”

The smuggler’s eyes narrow as if this is her first time stealing from the Empire, and then shrugs indifferently.

“Don’t expect me to come get you if you screw up,” he says, and finishes off his drink. His partner says something Jyn doesn’t quite catch and the smuggler laughs, a grimace etching his features.

“Chewie says to watch your back,” he adds. “Word is the Imps are looking for some rebel ship nearby. Could be trouble.”

She nods and slides out of the booth, her calm manner belying the sudden uptick of her heart. _Rebels_. It’s too little to go on and too dangerous to hope, but the ache of Saw’s abandonment is still a sharp wound in her chest. Beyond that, the tattered fragments of her mentor’s intermittent warnings still flutter at the surface of her mind.

If they’re not here for her, she can’t give them a reason to be, and if they _are_ here for her, she’s in more trouble than even Solo knows.

(As she slips out of the cantina, she shoulders past a stern-looking man in a leather jacket heading in the direction she just came from, sharp eyes parsing out the crowd behind her.)

+

Before he approaches the table Solo is known to frequent, Cassian casts a steady glance around the cantina. Patrons from all across the galaxy mingle with locals but no obvious Imperial plants catch his eye. When Solo spots him, the smuggler sits up straighter in the booth and his hand settles more comfortably over the blaster at this side.

(Cassian knows the type.) 

He hovers near the bar patiently, palms spread out and a friendly smile plastered on his face. After a few moments, Solo gives in and jerks his head at the empty seat in front of him. The younger man moves carefully, gauging his mark. Nothing much had changed in the months since they last crossed paths, except for the price the Rebellion was willing to pay.

“I told you I wasn’t interested,” Solo grumbles before Cassian even speaks, his tone bitter and annoyed. “I’m not interested in your Rebellion or your cause. I work for myself. No political entanglements.”

Cassian sizes the smuggler up as he considers the strength of Solo’s claim. Solo was known to work alone, and to work for many parties, but he had at least one weakness.

“You won’t work for just anyone,” Cassian says. “I understand. But the Rebellion has assets that may interest you.” He casts a look at Solo’s partner. “Smugglers who turn down work from Imperials must have some loyalties.”

Solo scowls and his partner lets out a worried growl. “Not. Interested.” Solo repeats and Cassian shrugs, ready to play his hand. He stands, feigning acceptance.

“I see,” he says. “I just thought you would be interested in work that paid four thousand credits.”

He makes it two steps before Solo breaks. “Wait,” he says, and Cassian looks over his shoulder. “Four thousand credits? Upfront?”

“Every other month,” Cassian says, his expression neutral. 

For a second it looks like a win – but a moment later Solo’s face closes up again.

“No,” he adds, and when his partner growls in protest he holds a hand out in front of him. “We’re not interested.”

Something in his answer tips Cassian off – the man is not just interested in money. There’s something more to his motivation.

He can work with that.

(He just has to find out what it is.)

+

A few months after her first job with Solo and Chewbacca, she finds herself crossing paths with them again. They’ve been tasked with intercepting a spice shipment and while hacking is not really her forte so much as the other thing, one successful mission together is more than other partnerships can boast.

She takes the work, lurking in the back of the _Falcon_ as the human and Wookie argue in the cockpit. Four years on her own taught her how to read the intricacies of a relationship better than Saw’s camp ever did, and she already knows that while Solo wants to get paid, he’d jettison the whole mission – her included – to save his friend.

It’s admirable insofar as it doesn’t get her killed.

It also means he’s worried.

They drop her off at an isolated outpost with enough credits to rent a speeder to another. From there, she’ll work her way inside the spice depot and change the flight plan for the next shipment. The _Falcon_ will be waiting to intercept the transport shuttle on its way to the Hutt fleet, and if one Hutt gangster wants to steal from another, that’s not really her business.

(In Hutt territory, it’s nobody’s business.)

She works quickly and quietly at the depot, the hour long after midnight and the only witnesses passersby who know better than to ask strange questions. Her fingers cramp as she pulls wires apart, reworking the lockpad until it accepts her gentle suggestion to open without an access card.

“Come on,” she mutters, tugging at a green wire in frustration, wrapping the copper thread around another exposed section. “Come on already.” With a disappointed beep, the lockpad finally has pity on her. The back door to the depot slides open and she releases a shaky breath, counting backwards.

One site inspector impersonation later, she’s altered the flight plan and back on her way to the bay where the beacon she’d hidden on the ship confirms the _Falcon_ is. The smugglers might have kept to their bargain anyway, or they might not have. If Saw had taught her anything, it was to watch what the left hand of your partner was doing as they extended you their right. Partners, he’d warned, would betray you more often than your enemies – all the more because you’d never give your enemies the chance.

He probably hadn’t meant the words to apply to himself, but she at last had learned not to take any chances.

Crossing through the alleys of the ship bay, she crosses paths with a tall woman whose reddish-gold hair stands out in this sector. Something makes the hair on the back of her neck stand up and she pulls her scarf closer around her hair, ducking her head as they pass.

When she mentions it to Solo, suspecting something was up, he lets out the filthiest curse she’s heard this month as Chewie lets out a warning growl.

“I know, I know,” Solo says. “We barely stayed ahead of them this time.” He looks at Jyn, adding, “thanks for the intel, kid. We might even skip past them in orbit now.”

When they finally do get paid, she parts ways with the harried smugglers, thinking she’s probably better off without them.

(She’s not wrong.)

+

Over the next few months, Cassian spends what time he has digging into Solo’s past and what might motivate him. The man’s history is as murky as Talakian ale but a few details scrub clean. He hails from Corellia and has known ties to the pirate Shrike and the Hutt crime lord Jabba. He was known to work with other smugglers and criminals if the price was right but aside from his partner Chewbacca, Solo lacked many personal ties. His criminal network, on the other hand, was as extensive as it was real. 

With few leads by which to crack the man open, he focuses on the other demands on his time. Solo is a mid-level priority and while Draven would like him to turn the smuggler, there are more valuable assets to follow and extract.

(Rumors of Imperial projects trail through the galaxy, whispering of the highest danger of all.)

But one afternoon as he recovers from his last mission, K2 complaining the corner, he comes across a note in a dossier he’d been reviewing that unlocks the whole kriffing mystery. When he demands access to the full encrypted file, Draven has to get clearance from above, something Cassian had never seen before.

When Cassian finally reads the file, he shuts his eyes in frustration. Converting Solo won’t just be difficult; it’s going to be damn near impossible.

He turns the details over in his mind as he calculates a new strategy, determining whether it’s even worth pursuing Solo at this point: a successful Rebel mission; spice shipments stolen, Imperial ships shot down; and an entire cadre of criminals betrayed by the Alliance.

One name in the file presents the possibility of hope, though it’s the last name he’d have expected to see. 

Shoving off from his workstation, he heads to Headquarters, intent on tracking down the woman who had taught him about deep cover and shooting blind to see whether she has any bright ideas about reconciling her former lover to the Rebellion.

(Despite everything he knows about her, he somehow doubts it.)

+

After the haul from the spice job, Jyn keeps her head down, moving from place to place. Instead of working with the usual suspects, she takes a job protecting cargo from people like herself and burns one of her aliases in the process when an ex-partner blows her cover. She works her way across the galaxy as a mechanic and takes a large payout from unloading cargo that she doesn’t ask about.

Most of all, she does her best to avoid Rebels and Imperials alike, Saw’s final warning ringing clear in her memory. She only lands in jail once after being pinned down by stormtroopers and manages to escape using a hidden knife. The nights are long and the days longer. When she can, she hides out in abandoned buildings and empty caves, counting backwards to fall asleep, one eye open.

Eventually, she joins up with a crew shipping medicine to the Outer Rim. The crew is friendly but she’s never integrated easily and doesn’t encourage them. The captain is a tall woman with a fresh scar that stretches from her chin down below her collar, and Jyn’s eyes linger on her in spite of herself. Something about her is familiar, and the fact that she can’t place her is a constant worrystone that makes her keep her distance. 

(Beyond that, the gossip among the crew confirms suspicions she already has about the ship’s true mission and allegiance. _Trust your instincts, Jyn,_ Saw had warned her. _They will keep you alive when even I cannot._ )

After the first successful delivery, the captain pulls her aside and offers her a permanent place on the crew if she wants it.

“You’re good, Hallik,” the captain says, her eyes mirroring Jyn’s own. “You’re reliable, and it’s better not to be on your own out here on the Rim.” Jyn locks eyes with the woman, tilting her chin up in instinctive self-defense as the captain crosses her arms. “At least it’s three steady meals.”

(It’s promising, enticing, and something more, but her feet itch and her instincts tell her to run, her fathers’ legacies stretching long.)

“I can’t,” she finally says, looking past the captain to the crew. “But I can stay on for another delivery if you need help.”

She almost changes her mind after the surprise of her life, after the captain risks herself and crew to break her out of a local jail when the job goes south. She almost stays – until she overhears comm chatter from the bridge about a _Imperial science officer_ and her ears stretch, catching the word _Erso_.

(After that, she runs.)

The next few months are lean for work and everything else. She survives like Saw taught her, like her mama taught her, and clutches the kyber crystal at her neck like a worry stone, counting backwards to fall asleep as she wonders how much it's worth.

She could trade it – she _should_ trade it. It’s probably worth enough to feed her and put a roof over her head, but still, somehow, she clings to it – the last remnant of her childish past.

When she runs into Solo and his copilot looking for reliable thieves to work on a big score, she leaps at the chance and tucks the crystal back beneath her clothes.

(It’s not _hope_ , she thinks, but something more wishful, that still clings to her.)

+

Tharen is in a bad mood when she meets with Cassian, smarting from the loss of a potential recruit to her crew and the Rebellion. She pours a drink in the makeshift cantina on Yavin IV and wearily listens to Cassian’s report. There’s a long pause once he’s done where she waits expectantly, as if to hear something more, before leaning back in her seat.

“That’s it, Andor?” she asks. “You come here with old reports and theories and want me to fill them in for you?”

He knows this game. She’d taught it to him.

“I want to know if there’s any point to developing Solo further,” he says evenly, “given that he was _your_ contact before.” Tharen’s eyes are steady, with no trace of the young woman described in the report he’d found. “I don’t want to waste my time. Draven is sending me out to Ylesia on another mission this week.”

Tharen drops her chair back on all four legs and shrugs. “Sure,” she says, pinching the bridge of her nose. “Solo’s network is solid. You just need to increase your price.”

Cassian stares at her, incredulous. “I’m already offering him the best deal the Rebellion can afford,” he protests before Tharen shakes her head.

“Not credits,” she says. “He’s a smuggler. There’s something even he values more.” She waits for him to catch up and then rolls her eyes, impatient. “I taught you better than this, Andor. His _name_. We dragged it through the mud when we didn’t share the load he and his friends helped steal.” Her eyes cloud over and Cassian wonders just how many more mysteries this intel is going to bring back from the dead. “If you can find a way to salvage his reputation, you have a chance.”

It’s not much to go on but then again – it rarely is.

+

“Hey kid,” Solo says, tossing Jyn a meal packet, “you’ve got potential, you know that? We could use someone like you around more often.” Chewbacca roars his agreement and Jyn hesitates. Solo leans forward, clearly thinking too much of his charms and failing miserably. “What do you say, kid?” he asks and Jyn thinks of alley streets and grasping hands, considering the alternative.  
“Alright,” she agrees, hesitant. “But I get my own bunk.”

“Deal,” Solo says, and she figures she could do worse.

(The image of the last ship she was on springs to mind – she brushes it away, remembering she can’t actually do better.)

“And,” Solo adds, “I can show you how to beef up your identity. What kind of name is _Hallik_ anyway?”

Her scowl makes Chewie guffaw and Solo smirk, and despite herself, Jyn’s ire turns to a half-smile.

(She could definitely do worse.)

+

Solo slides into the seat across from Cassian with as much indifference as a man drawn by hard credits can muster. Cassian had chosen the place with the specific goal of putting Solo at ease – there were multiple accessible exits and dim lighting to obscure any prying eyes. It had been enough to draw Solo here, at least.

“How many times do I have to tell you,” Solo drawls, “I’m not interested.”

Cassian ignores the smuggler’s comment, his mere presence here belying that very claim. By now he knows that making a direct offer to Solo isn’t going to get him anywhere new. Instead, he pivots, moving to throw his opponent off balance.

“Bria Tharen sends her regards,” he says, leaning forward on his elbows and savoring the surprised look that Solo doesn’t quite manage to mask in time. “She also says to say hi to Chewie.”

Solo’s face is a tight grimace, his jaw clenched in control. “Is she here?”

 _No pretense then_ , Cassian thinks. _Good_.

“No,” he lies. Tharen was most certainly in the city, currently occupied with hacking the Falcon to see if there were any pressure points they could exploit with Solo or his friends. She hadn’t wanted to run into Solo if they could avoid it, but both spies knew it might become necessary.

“Then talk,” Solo says, but his expression doesn’t change.

So Cassian talks. He spins a story about changes in Alliance leadership ( _half-true_ ) and misinformation that had led to the last fiasco ( _false_ ) and a promise that the Alliance wasn’t just interested in an economic arrangement with Solo but a partnership that offered more ( _actually true_ ) and the promise of reparations to Solo’s partners in the last deal ( _where possible_ ). At the end of it Solo isn’t exactly swayed but he does seem more interested than at the start.

“Maybe,” he allows. “If Chewie agrees.” Despite all the difficulties the man has caused him, Cassian does respect him for that. So many former Imperial Academy types still carried the prejudices of their education but not, it seemed, Solo. He treated his friend like a real partner.

“One more thing,” Solo adds and Cassian winces internally. “I don’t want to see her. Ever. You got that?”

Cassian can barely hide his relief. “Not a problem,” he assures Solo. “I don’t even know where she is.”

_False._

(As he leaves, he bumps into a small woman with distractingly green eyes who soldiers past him without a glance, her short stature no obstacle to her determination.)

+

At first, when Solo and Chewie had informed her they’d be working with the Alliance on an upcoming mission, her heart had dropped into her stomach. Her partners weren’t family, and they weren’t even safe, but – it had been nice not being on the run for a change.

When Chewie explains the details of the mission, she relaxes enough to think straight. Solo and Chewie still don’t know her real identity, and there’s no reason to think that this mission in particular is a trap set by the Alliance to smoke out Erso’s daughter as a hostage. 

It’s an echo of their second job together with a larger contingent of pirate ships circling the transports in a net. She’s on the ground once more, tricking the navcomp into a new flight plan with more ease than last time. Solo’s network is large and she listens in on the comm traffic with a modified receiver as the smugglers sort out their positions.

But not everyone, it seems, is as quick to forgive the Alliance as Solo was. She barely has any warning before stormtroopers ambush her in the depot and she’s running, running for her life, dodging into alleyways and her heart pounding as she hears the makeshift fleet scatter, Solo’s comment to Chewie sending a chill down her spine.

“ _Better her than me._ ”

She goes down in a back street, surrounded by two dozen ‘troopers, her blaster yanked from her side and her arms wrenched behind her back.

(If she survives this, she thinks, she’s going to kill him.)

+

Cassian sits next to Tharen on the top of the temple that houses the Rebel base. Alderaanian beer that Viceroy Organa had sent aids their mourning over the loss of a potential network and months of hard work.

“Do you think it was Solo who sold them out?” Cassian asks, tilting the bottle against his lips as the sharp taste of the drink contrasts with the smooth feel of the beer. Tharen is slow to respond but she shakes her head at last, staring out at the quieting jungle.

“Not Han,” she says, using the smuggler’s name for the first time since the op began. “He wouldn’t risk Chewie. Wouldn’t work with Imperials anyway.” She shakes her head in frustration. “Hutts; not Imperials.”

“Their man on the ground was the only one caught, from the chatter we’ve picked up,” he says and Tharen winces.

“Woman,” she corrects and meets Cassian’s gaze. “I picked up some chatter of my own. A woman named Liana Hallik.”

The name seems to mean something to her but she doesn’t explain and Cassian doesn’t ask. It wasn’t the first time hapless assets were caught in the crossfire.

As the moon turns around the main planet, they sit in the lengthening dark, the shades of Yavin IV wrapping around them.

\+ 

As her cell door clangs shut behind her, Jyn take stock of her surroundings. She’d heard one of the ‘troopers say _Wobani_ but it could be a person or a system for all she knew. In the dim light, her cellmate sits up on her bunk, shaking a nest of insects out of her tentacles.

“You’re new,” her cellmate says, and when Jyn doesn’t respond, her cellmate leers at her. “That doesn’t last.”

She flops onto her bunk and flinches as a drop of murky water hits her forehead. Her cellmate chuckles darkly, leaning forward in the gloom.

“Welcome to Wobani Labor Camp,” she sneers. “Call me Nail. What do I call you?”

Instead of replying, Jyn swings her feet up and lies on her back, staring at the ceiling. “I don’t care,” she says, and rests her palm on her chest. Beneath her clothes, the edges of the kyber crystal are just barely visible. She’d smuggled it in with her, forgoing other options for escape. Apparently it was worth more to her than even she’d realized. “Call me whatever you like.”

For the first time in her life, she didn’t have a way out. Maybe, she thinks, she’ll die here, even without the Empire or Alliance having a grand plan about it. She had no partners coming to save her this time, no hidden knives, not even a real idea of where she was. All she had was herself and the kyber crystal, and more danger around the corner. Maybe she _would_ die here. Imperial labor camps were not known for their kindness.

(At the thought, somewhere within her, a flicker of defiant hope struggles to stay alive, protesting the darkness.)

 _Maybe not_ , she grants. Maybe not.

She shuts her eyes and counts backwards to fall asleep, one eye open.

_Finis_

**Author's Note:**

> A note about Bria Tharen training Cassian - in this AU where the EU as it is no longer works with the Rebel Alliance forming _much_ earlier, I figured it was possible that when Bria joined up it wasn't just a resistance cell and it was early enough that she, with her particular skill set, could have eventually trained/mentored Cassian as a spy since in the EU she canonically _is_ trained at deep cover work. I also like the idea of Jyn and Cassian just missing each other but Cassian's mission to solve the puzzle of the Death Star still having butterfly effects on Jyn's life while she's on the run.
> 
> (Also, Bria definitely doesn't die this time around and she and Leia are definitely friends, I make the rules, not sorry.)
> 
> I'm [ladytharen](http://ladytharen.tumblr.com) on Tumblr if you want to say hi :)


End file.
